AN: Many, many apologies to any of you out there who still remember that this story exists and have been waiting for updates. In between the last posting and now I was travelling, started a new job, packed and moved while getting settled into said new job, and then helped my brother renovate a house and move into it. I really thought I was going to be able to write while doing all those things, but they took more mental and physical energy than I was anticipating. I never forgot about this story, though it's been slow going getting back into the writing of it. Thanks for your patience and your reminders that people were waiting on this.
A quick recap of the previous chapters:
April's pre-teen ramblings led Luke to a better understanding of his part in the disastrous end of his relationship with Lorelai, and from there out of anger into a downward spiral of guilt. Jess arrived back in Stars Hollow to a radically altered Luke, just in time for June 3rd – and one particular delivery on that very day—to wreak even more havoc on Luke's equilibrium. Rory unsuccessfully tried to draw Lorelai out of her guilt and false bravado, but Lorelai chose to face June 3rd alone. Jess and Rory's reunion got off to a rocky start, but they found common ground again in the desire to help their parental figures heal and they came up with a plan to try to force Luke and Lorelai to confront their problems and each other. Rory confronted Luke with her own bitterness and anger over the end of his relationship with Lorelai and the two came to a tentative understanding.
June 7, 2006
It had shocked more than a few people when Jess had the guys in Philly send him all the work he could do remotely and had taken over his old room above the diner for a more extended visit than he had originally planned. He spends his days with one eye on his work and the other on Luke's moods and his alcohol consumption. He can't work this way forever, but it will work for a little while—long enough, hopefully, to see Luke into a better frame of mind. Whether it will be long enough to see any fruit from his and Rory's plan remains to be seen. It's a bare-bones plan, not a long complex scheme. Just enough, they hope, to get them to start a conversation. From there, it'll be up to Luke and Lorelai.
If Luke has guessed that Jess' sudden desire to remain in Stars Hollow is on his behalf, he hasn't commented on it.
Early Wednesday evening, nearly a full week after his arrival, finds Jess trudging up the steps and reluctantly knocking on the Crap Shack's door again. This is not an errand he relishes, but it's his responsibility, and he's anxious to get it out of the way, anxious to see if it will do any good.
"Rory's not here," Lorelai tells him when she opens the door, that brittle, polite smile in place again. "She just went out."
He knows this already, had helped orchestrate that very fact. He looks her straight in the eye.
"I'm not here to see Rory, I'm here to talk to you."
A startled look passes over the face that has worn a carefully-controlled mask ever since she opened the door.
"Well," she falters, "come in, I guess," she says, opening the door wider and sweeping an arm to usher him in.
He comes in but doesn't sit, notices that the house seems cleaner than he remembers it, wonders if that means anything. Lorelai doesn't sit either, but stands with her eyes shifting from bookcase to door to couch to tv— in short, to everything but him.
"Look," he begins, forcing her to look him in the eye, "I don't think it's any secret that we're not crazy about each other."
Her mouth moves as if to protest, but it closes at his level look.
"You don't like me much, and frankly, there are plenty of people I'd prefer to hang out with, especially now."
He watches as the curiosity on her face crumples at his last words, and then the mask reappears. Despite what everyone else here may think, he has never relished hurting people. But he and Rory had agreed on this: subtlety and sympathy had done no good. It was time to try the harsher, more honest, more direct approach.
"You don't have to like me, but today you do have to listen to me."
She nods in acquiescence and they stare at each other for a moment, tired blue eyes meeting fierce brown, before he barrels on.
"Are you happy, Lorelai?" He starts abruptly, "Because you don't seem happy to me."
Lorelai's eyes shift away from him and he wonders if he imagined the water that pooled in them before she looked away. He ignores it.
"And my uncle? He's miserable." He says plainly.
He watches her as he says it, sees the almost imperceptive tightening of her jaw, the way she blinks a little faster to clear the extra moisture from her dull eyes.
"The thing is, I'm pretty sure you're both miserable for the same reason, which makes it a stupid reason, because you both have the power to fix things for yourselves and you're just too blind to or too stubborn to do anything about it.
"You're sitting around here wallowing because you don't think he'll ever forgive you. He's sitting over there wallowing because he thinks he made such a big mistake that you'll never take him back. Frankly, I don't care if you think you deserve to be forgiven. What I do know is that Luke deserves to be happy, and if that means being with you, then that's what he should get."
They stand for long moments. Lorelai is uncharacteristically silent, with wide, shocked eyes staring back at him. When he speaks, his voice is a little gentler.
"You tried to tell me once that we had a lot in common. I didn't want to listen, but you were right. Only, it's not what you thought it was."
He sees the curiosity flare in her eyes again. She wears a careful, neutral façade, but if you look closely enough you can see through the cracks. She's dying to hear more of whatever he's going to say.
"Luke loves us." He stumbles over the word, not used to having to speak it. "Even if we're stupid and hateful and hurt him. I haven't quite figured out yet how he keeps on doing it, but he does."
Lorelai's mouth opens as if to protest, but he preempts her objection.
"He's pretty good at forgiving your stupid mistakes. I should know. Liz and I have given him enough opportunities."
He turns to ready himself to go, aware that Lorelai is still oddly silent. He turns back as he opens the door.
"I didn't come here today to bond over our commonalities. I came here today because I owe Luke. Yeah, you hurt him, but I'm pretty sure you still have the power to fix him, and he deserves to be happy. If you won't give it a shot for yourself, then do it because Luke deserves it."
His piece said, he turns to go. He's almost out the door when Lorelai's rusty voice finally catches up to him.
"Jess?"
"Yeah?"
Her face appears in the space of the half open door. "It's true, I didn't care for you much for a while there, but I think you've turned out pretty good."
He turns away again, throwing his reply over his shoulder as he starts for the porch steps.
"Yeah, well, blame Luke. I'm pretty sure it's his fault."
Jess slams the door when he arrives back at the apartment, more out of a desire for a reaction from Luke than for any other reason. What once would have earned him a sharp reprimand receives only an unintelligible grunt. His next attempts at conversation receive the same response.
In at least one respect, Jess is more like Luke than he realizes—they both have a low tolerance for things they consider stupid, and the current situation has made Jess' list of Very Stupid Things. At the fourth grunt, he strides over to face his uncle head on.
"You think I don't get it?" Jess asks him. "You think I don't know what it's like to love a Gilmore girl and then lose her through your own stupid choices? The thing is, yours still wants you. You've still got a chance, and you're too busy feeling guilty to just man up and take it. So she made a stupid choice. If that made you stop wanting her, you sure wouldn't still be acting like this. From the sounds of it, you made plenty of your own stupid choices, and she apparently still wants you. At this point, you're both just being stupid. Go have your fight. We all know there'll be one. Just get it over with and move on."
Jess leaves his words hanging in the air and stomps to his room, just for old time's sake.
